


Markers of Eugenic Manipulation

by harrycrewe



Series: Spring Tide [3]
Category: Star Trek (2009)
Genre: Assisted Suicide, Parent Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-03-30
Updated: 2012-03-30
Packaged: 2017-11-02 17:53:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,588
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/371739
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/harrycrewe/pseuds/harrycrewe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Leonard learns that he has more than a little augment ancestry.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Markers of Eugenic Manipulation

**Author's Note:**

> Prequel 2 of "That ebb and flow"

Earth, year 2245

 

It was August, and the weather was swelteringly hot and humid. Not as bad as Georgia, of course, but then nothing was quite like a Georgia summer. Inside Turner Auditorium they’d set the climate controls to pleasantly cool: an action by the administration that many of the more idealistic medical students nevertheless protested, as they considered a certain exposure to normal variations in temperature natural to humans, and felt that avoiding air-conditioning was better for the environment. McCoy wondered if the people of two hundred years and fifty ago, when AC had first become common in the United States, could have predicted that popular sentiment would shift away from the use of the wasteful technology: his family’s old farmhouse in Georgia had had its first set of aircon units put in around 1970, and the last set stripped out again sometime around 2200. Now that Gram was getting older, the family was starting to worry that the summer heat was too much of a strain for her: perhaps they would refit the house with some new, environmentally-friendly model. 

Going without air conditioning at the medical school would have been impractical though, as the auditorium, like most other parts of the hospital complex, was antiquated and had never been built to allow for good natural air flow. Furthermore – McCoy’s gaze slid towards a lithe blue-skinned man in the front row - there were several Andorians in the class, and it would be inappropriate to force them to suffer unnecessarily.

The lights darkened as Doctor Engelmann entered, that day’s lecture flashing up on McCoy’s personal PADD as well as on the screen behind him. The students in front of him shifted nervously, for the syllabus had already alerted them to the topic of that day’s lecture.

“Chromosomal Markers of Eugenic Manipulation”

McCoy considered the Andorian again, wondering if the being was aware of the historical events making the mood so tense today – could he/she even judge that the mood was tense? Two hundred years, and “eugenic” was still a dirty word, a word with power. It could make a bunch of fancy-pants students at The Johns Hopkins School of Medicine cringe even worse than the average person, because a smart kid getting called an augment in the school yard for the first time was the kind of memory that stuck. 

Engelmann took control, though – firmly, dispassionately, bringing an antiseptically scientific tone to the lecture that allowed almost everyone to breathe a collective sigh of relief: they were doctors, or they soon will be, and the aftermath of eugenic manipulation, like sex and scatology, was merely one more topic that would have to be studied in order to do their jobs well. 

He began with some brief introductory remarks about the migration of eugenic genes into the general population – despite all their talk of non-mixing and super-human superiority, it seems that some Augments, at least, hadn’t practice their religion in the bedroom – and then moved into the topic of intelligence, perhaps the least sensational of all the subjects they will race through today. 

Leonard wasn’t particularly nervous. There was no reason to be, it was just one more subject that had to be covered sooner or later. But the talk still reminded him of things he’d rather forget. That most of the McCoys lived to a hundred and twenty or more, except for a few who contracted extremely rare genetic diseases. That when one of his cousins had a genetic profiling done, it yielded an array of genetic markers rarely found in natural combination - Bantu, Aborigine, and Shipibo. It was possible, but unlikely, that they had ancestors from each of those three continents; what was more probable was that one or two of their great-great-great-grandparents were Supermen, real genuine made-to-order human beings who had either sowed their wild oats in Georgia or perhaps assimilated there, trying to pass for normal, after the fall of Khan. 

Only a few weeks earlier, he and Joss had gone in together for her first-trimester genetic counseling appointment. It had been a relief to know that the baby was healthy and that no genetic manipulation (it was only legal in the case of severe medical defects) would be required. That was all that the counselor had told them: he would never have mentioned markers of augmentation, if there were any, just as he would never have attempted to decipher for them the color of the baby’s hair or eyes, its athletic potential or likely adult appearance. That was all part of the complicated set of ethical regulation that had surrounded genetic information since the post-Great War period: only an adult patient and his or her doctor had the rights to view a complete profile, even parents had permission only to learn what was medically necessary. 

As Dr. Engelmann's voice droned on, Len thought of his baby, floating in the comfortable darkness of Joss’s womb. He then imagined her as a young woman. In his mind she was of medium height and had brown hair like Joss’s, but her face was yet unclear. One day she might go to her doctor and be surprised to find a trace of evil blood, the legacy of human cruelty stamped into her DNA, just as it was probably stamped into Len’s. But the hard edge of cynicism with which had had always considered the matter before seeped away before this vision of his little girl. He hoped she wouldn’t mind about the genes, hoped she would understand, as he did already, that they made not a difference at all: she was going to be beautiful, wondrous, and perfect. 

 

At the end of their second year, all medical students were supposed to undergo a thorough examination, to check that their immunizations were up-to-date and to make sure that they did not have any undiagnosed conditions which might put them or their patients at risk once they began their hospital rotations in year three. It was merely a formality, although the rumors did persist about the one student who had been discovered to have a latent autoimmune disorder, and so forth. 

Len put the exam off twice, not because he had any problem with it but because Jocelyn had just given birth. He took two weeks off after they brought Joanna home with them, which then left him behind in all his studying, research and lectures, and then from weeks three through eight of his daughter’s new life he was running constantly between the hospital, the library, errands and home, so busy that he hardly even saw Joss, and probably wouldn’t have seen much of Jo, either, except that he often stayed awake so late studying that he was up anyway when she began to cry. When that happened he let Joss sleep, warmed milk to the perfect temperature, and held Jo as she drank and then walked her around until she burped and nodded off again. He was exhausted nearly all the time, and he didn’t do quite as well on his Step I as he should have, but those moments stolen late at night to be with baby Jo were worth it. 

As soon as the Step I’s were over they had scheduled a trip back to Cordele, to introduce Jo to all her grandparents. They had a month, and Joss wanted to spend it all there. It was going to leave Len was going to be so behind in his work that he’d never catch up, but he had agreed anyway. It was only at the last minute that he realized that his first rotation was scheduled for the day after he got back; and that he still hadn’t received medical clearance: he called the student clinic and begged for a last-minute appointment. 

 

The doctor he met there was named Anand, a petite, round-faced woman of about fifty-five or so. It just so happened that Len has been reading papers on micronutrient deficiency by a doctor of that name with a Hopkins affiliation; he asked if she was the same Anand, and when it turned out she was they begin to chat about her research as she went through the various steps of the visit – tricorder scans, blood, and so forth.

“It is in fact very interesting, that even after three hundred years we still do not understand all the components necessary to sustain human health in the long term.” She said. “Every year we discover one or two more. Many of the original studies on this subject were done when cardiovascular disease and cancer were still the major causes of death – in other words, people died so young that the impact of deficiencies that only become significant after the first century of life was largely unknown.”

She paused in her speech to check the results of his blood work. 

“Everything looks all right here – although your hormone levels are a bit unusual, it matches your medical records from last year – it says here the physician is David McCoy?”

“My father,” Len explained. “I come from a small town; he’s the only doc for miles.”

“Yes. I don’t know why we have so much trouble getting physicians to stay in rural communities, it’s not as though they can’t just travel – hm. Well, this is a bit odd.”

“What is it?” He asked.

Surprisingly, she hesitated. “Just let me confirm something first, please.”

She tucked her tricorder into her coat pocket and unhinged from the wall a full body scanner. “If you don’t mind…?”

As a matter of fact, Len did mind, but he hopped up on the table anyway and held still as the scanner passed over his body. Anand paused the machine halfway down, made a note on her PADD, and then completed the scan.

“Mr. McCoy,” she said, seriously. “Have you ever undergone genetic screening?”

The weird markers, Len thought, she’s found them.

“I don’t know,” He said, cautiously. “I mean, I assume my parents did it after my conception, normal genetic testing.”

“Hm, yes,” she said, pausing for a moment, presumably while she calls that screen up in his charts. “You are aware that your genotype is a little bit unusual?”

What the hell does that mean? Len snorted mentally. “Dr. Anand, as I understand it, given that we carry over twenty thousand genes, almost everyone has at least a couple of rare sequences. I’m aware that there might have been an augment somewhere a couple of generations back, if that’s what you mean.”

“Yes,” she said, bluntly. “This should have been included in your charts.”

“What do you mean? It is included in my charts – the genetic data is right there.”

“I meant your uterus. It’s been left out of your medical history entirely. Although… I don’t see any serious childhood injuries reported in your records, and you say your father’s practice is small. If you’ve never occasion to undergone a full body scan before, perhaps it was missed?”

It wasn’t actually possible, but he swore he could feel his stomach literally rising into his throat. He was suddenly gasping for breath. “My what?” He heard himself asking, sounding like a distant voice.

“Mr. McCoy! Mr. McCoy, you’d better sit down.” Firm hands on his shoulders guided him into a chair. He took three or four deep breaths, and then twenty or thirty progressively steadier ones. He felt light-headed, and when he looked up Dr. Anand’s brown eyes were concerned.

“I apologize, Mr. McCoy, I should have spoken more carefully. I assume you were aware of this.”

“No!”

“Functional hermaphroditism; one of Dr. Soong’s late-stage experiments. It’s estimated at this time that about one-half of one percent of men are affected – although, naturally, this varies significantly by geographic region. Each substantial marker of Augment ancestry increases the odds by a factor of eight. In other words, Mr. McCoy, you’re a carrier.”

Dr. Engelmann’s lecture was coming back to Len – even bits of it he didn’t think he remembered, he heard the man’s dry, precise voice droning into his ear, echoing Dr. Anand’s voice. 

“There’s nothing to worry about, Mr. McCoy,” She assured him. “There’s nothing wrong with you, and you know of course that your medical records are completely confidential.” She paused. “It says here you are married…?”

“Yes,” Len said, not quite understanding but relieved in the change of subject nonetheless. “Joss, my wife. Our daughter Joanna just turned two months old.”

“Congratulations.” She paused. “The second reproductive system doesn’t seem to be causing you any problems, so I’m hesitant to recommend removal. On the other hand, would I be correct in saying you are unlikely to wish to carry your own children, in the future?”

He shook his head. 

“Well, take some time to think about it, there’s no urgency. If at some point in the future you are considering a sexual relationship with another man; think about birth control. Otherwise, you’re in good shape to start your rotation in the fall.”

He took another half hour to sit and compose himself at the clinic before staggering back to the apartment, all the while wondering how his father could have missed this. Granted, his Dad didn’t have a full-body scanner in Cordele – and Len always was pretty healthy as a kid, so perhaps there had never been much need of one – but a fucking functional uterus, that was just too much to have missed entirely. His father was many, many things – but less then thorough was never one of them. 

Then it hit him – what if his Dad did know, but had decided not to tell him? 

He was only a couple of blocks away from the apartment when Joss rang him. “Where are you?” She sounded upset.

“Nearly home.”

“Why are you so late? Len, I’ve had an awful day, the baby wouldn’t stop crying.”

He knew she didn’t mean anything by it, but he hated when she called Jo, “the baby”, it seemed impersonal.

“I got a little held up at the doctor’s.”

“You promised you’ve be home by two.”

He thought about telling her why he was delayed, but decided in a moment that he wouldn’t. Not that Joss was prejudiced, but augment genes would have been a lot for many people to handle anyway (he could just imagine her mother and aunts whispering at the dinner table about aggression and just-call-if-you-don’t-feel-safe). And the uterus thing was even worse: he was still a man, of course, but he didn’t know if he trusted her not to think less of him. 

“Sorry,” he said, finally, already knowing it might not salvage the situation if she was itching for a fight. By then, he had rounded the corner, and was coming up to their brownstone apartment building. Joss was standing on the front porch, looking pretty and looking like trouble all at once, Jo slung over one hip.

“Sorry isn’t going to cut it, Len.”

“I couldn’t do anything about it.”

“I’ve been stuck here all day– you need to take her for a while, so that I can run and get presents for Mom and Dad before we leave in the morning.” She bit her lip. “We are still leaving in the morning, aren’t we?”

“Yes, yes,” he promised, coming up to take Jo away from her, planting a peck on her cheek that she didn’t lean into, but didn’t shy away from either. Things would be better once they got the break, he hoped, and Joss some time with her folks.

“Thank goodness for that, at least”, she mumbled, following him inside. As they opened the door, the comm started ringing, Joss went over to accept the call. “Miriam,” she said, a little anxious, at the face that appeared: she and Len’s mother didn’t really get on all that well. Len came, bouncing Jo, to rescue her.

“Mom, how’s it going? We’ll be there by dinner tomorrow…”

His mother’s eyes looked a bit red, but the comm always played with her skin tone, sometimes turning it blotched or sallow; Len had been thinking lately that they should get a new unit. It wasn’t until his mother started to lose control of herself that he realized something was terribly wrong.

“Leo,” she was crying. “Len, come as soon as you can, alright, dear? I’m afraid it’s your father…”

 

His father had had thick brown hair; some of Leonard’s earliest memories were of grabbing it, two-handed, when he was very young, shrieking with excitement from his perch on David’s shoulders. Nothing as an adult could compare to those moments of perfect delight: his father held him safe, his father could do anything, he would hold Leonard up high, brown eyes twinkling, and swing him down again, Leo would run on chubby legs, waiting for strong arms to scoop him up; the rarest thing in the world was thick between them. 

On hot days in summer in Cordele, when the water in the air was so hot and so thick that even the dogs lost their energy, and lay drooping on the porch like lazy-ole-hounds, and Leonard was about five or six, he would stay at his father’s feet in his office where it was cool, and his father would take down his medical equipment, the modern tools but particularly the collection of antique ones, and allow Leo to arrange them in rows along the carpet while he went through his paperwork. The stethoscope, the blood pressure cuff, a very old reflex hammer: Leo would ask, “What does this one do? What about this one?” and though he forgot again and again, David would always calmly remind him. “I want to be a doctor,” Leonard would say, to make his dad smile, and his father always responded, “well, that’ll be your decision.” 

Leo was as stubborn as a mule, his Mom liked to say, as stubborn as your old man. “You’ll change your mind a thousand times before you’re grown,” she said, every time she informed her of his plans, “next you’ll be saying you want to be a firefighter or a spaceman.” It just made him mad. His father wasn’t like that, his father understood. “It’s your decision,” David said, now and then, “but if you do set your mind to becoming a doctor, I’m sure you’ll work hard to become a good one.” 

But he had married Joss and gone off to medical school without even noticing that his father’s hair was going gray, didn’t put together that it was too quick a thing, too young, to early. Almost all the McCoys lived to a hundred and twenty, but not this one, not the way things were going. He had even read about Adelphi syndrome in his first-year textbooks, and learned about it from Dr. Englemann, but never put the pieces together. He had never remembered to ask why his father’s voice was sometimes slow, or why he began to refuse the vid connection when they chatted on the comm, preferring to talk with audio only. 

David hadn’t told anybody about it right away, so by the time his mother commed Len the disease was already becoming severe. The month that was supposed to have been a breath of fresh air for him and Joss turned into half a year, as he took a leave of absence and moved back in with his parents – Joss, for her part, found the cloud over the house understandably stifling and soon took Jo to stay with her parents, just down the street.

By November, his father had weakened so much that making it to the bathroom, even with help, became impossible. His doctors wanted him moved to the hospital, but everyone protested – instead, nurses begin coming in to provide 24-hours care. His father lay shriveled in his blankets, and Len knew that each rasping breath must have felt like a knife, sharp against his lungs. When he was not too heavily sedated, Len would sit and read to him during the few hours he awoke, and although his father rarely spoke because of the pain, his eyes tracked Len’s movement ceaselessly. They read Heinlein and Bester and Asimov together, from antique, soft-paper novels, his father’s old favorites, and then Len would read aloud excerpts from latest New England Journal, as if that even mattered anymore. Sometimes David would smile, when Len placed his hand against the mattress, he would reach out and pat it, though his hands were often purple with bruising and the bones so fragile they felt like glass. They were trying to be strong for each other, but sometimes Len had to leave the room to cry. 

Finally one day his father looked at him and Len knew, even before his father painfully whispered the words, what he was going to ask. It was December, and there had been freezing rain the night before, horrible slick stuff that Len had come to resent for not being proper snow or rain, but he took the hovercar immediately to the pharmacy and refilled the most toxic of his father’s prescriptions, and all of his sedatives, knowing that if he waited too long or thought too much, he wouldn’t be able to do what needed to be done.

David McCoy died on December 18th, 2246. Len never asked him about omission from his own medical record, whether his father had known about his carrier status or not – in the midst of all that was happening, he lost his will to know. 

The cure for Adelphi syndrome was discovered six months later.


End file.
